Friday, November 11, 2011

Hale Moana Bed & Breakfast participated in the B&B for Vets Initiative for the second year, where hundreds of B&Bs throughout the US and Canada honor active and retired veterans with free rooms in recognition of their services.

We were so pleased and honored to host Lani & Cody Cook from Aiea on Oahu for our Veteran’s Day Special. Cody is an E4 Fire Support Specialist and his reserve unit is part of the 100th Battalion 442nd Infantry Regiment. He was deployed to Afghanistan in 2008 and his unit is scheduled to go back in 2012.

Lani and Cody, originally from Kauai, are a young couple and have been married for three years. It has been tough for them lately as Cody lost his regular job at Schofield Barracks on Oahu as a security guard. Because of Federal cut-backs he and 69 others were laid off in August. Since then the couple has lived on Lani’s Bank-of-Hawaii-income and unemployment. It has been a struggle to pay their rent and get by. Lani explained, that ever since then she has become a follower of Krazy Suzy's Coupons and in Suzy’s weekly newsletter is also where she found out about the B&Bs for Vets Initiative.

Lani said, “This was a blessing for us. We had not been on a vacation since we got married.” When they checked out the B&Bs for Vets website, however, they realized that there were only B&Bs on Maui and the Big Island participating in the initiative. Their hopes sank, because they did not think they would be able to afford a trip to another island. But then they realized that Hawaiian Airline miles would pay for their tickets and that they would be able to spend time with family in Kona for a few days. The stay at Hale Moana Bed & Breakfast was their last night and highlight of their trip before they went back home.

They both said that they had a wonderful time here on the Big Island, leaving their financial worries behind and just enjoying life for a few days.

We are so happy, that this special went to a young couple in need, who would have not been able to afford a stay here otherwise. We all felt, that the Aloha of this special place Hawaii embraced all of us and our souls touched for a brief moment. We truly wish them the very best and we feel blessed to have met them. We all promised to stay in touch.

1 comment:

This is the first time I've flown with Hawaiian Airlines and I thought it was great. The people were very nice and made me feel welcome. I had to sit next to the bathroom going to Oahu, wish I knew that before hand. I think the stewardess felt bad for us so she gave us a lot of extra snacks and drinks. The one thing I didn't like was that you had to pay to watch TV/movies and listen to music. The monitors didn't seem to work well most of the time, but since you had to pay for everything I guess it doesn't matter. before booking i used hawaiian air coupons